{"id":804886,"date":"2020-03-04T15:45:03","date_gmt":"2020-03-04T22:45:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.summitdaily.com\/?p=379942"},"modified":"2020-03-04T15:45:03","modified_gmt":"2020-03-04T22:45:03","slug":"frisco-council-declines-to-pursue-new-revenue-streams-despite-rising-expenses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/local-news\/frisco-council-declines-to-pursue-new-revenue-streams-despite-rising-expenses\/","title":{"rendered":"Frisco council declines to pursue new revenue streams despite rising expenses"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
A view of downtown Frisco’s Main Street on Tuesday, Dec. 17.<\/strong>
Liz Copan \/ ecopan@summitdaily.com<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

FRISCO \u2014 Annual expenditures are growing much quicker than Frisco\u2019s revenue streams, and town officials are working to strike a balance between offering services and cutting costs. <\/p>\n

But until council members have a specific project in mind, they\u2019ve decided not to pursue any new revenue sources.<\/p>\n

\u201cLocal government has been asked to take on more than police, fire, streets and snow removal over the years,\u201d Frisco Town Manager Nancy Kerry said during a work session discussion on finances in late February. \u201cIncreasing revenue generally relies on increasing the number of visitors and customers. We\u2019ve obviously had an increase in customers over the last few years, so revenue is going up. But at the same time, with all the additional programs, services and activities, there\u2019s going to need to be additional revenue sources somewhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last month, town staff led a discussion on the town\u2019s revenue sources for council members as part of the town\u2019s 2019-20 strategic plan, highlighting the fact that the growth of expenditures has far exceeded increases in revenue over the past several years.<\/p>\n

Total revenue for the general fund, the town\u2019s chief operating fund, has risen about 8% over the past three years, from about $14.2 million in 2017 to an expected $15.3 million in 2020. During that same period, expenditures have grown nearly 31% from $10.4 million to $13.6 million.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think (those numbers) should be troubling to anyone that looks at them,\u201d Frisco Finance Director Bonnie Moinet said. \u201cIt\u2019s the reason council established the goal to look at these revenues, and that\u2019s why we had this discussion. \u2026 It hasn\u2019t taken very long for us to get to this point. And I don\u2019t think there\u2019s reason for alarm. The town is sound financially, but I certainly think it\u2019s an indicator that we need to be spending what revenues we have wisely.\u201d<\/p>\n

During the work session, staff walked council members through the town\u2019s existing economic drivers \u2014 namely Main Street, commercial and retail services along Summit Boulevard, the marina and the Frisco Adventure Park \u2014 and provided possibilities for ways to increase revenue. Ideas essentially fell into two categories: trying to increase current revenue streams through higher taxes and fees, and developing new streams through activities at the marina and Adventure Park.<\/p>\n

Tax increases would make an immediate impact. According to the town, a 1% increase to the sales tax would generate an additional $2.4 million, and a 1% increase to lodging taxes would generate an additional $230,000. But any tax increases would require voter approval, and councilors agreed that community members would be hard to convince, particularly without a set plan for spending the additional funds.<\/p>\n

Council members also balked at the idea of new revenue streams, such as the addition of summer tubing or wedding, event and music venues at the Frisco Adventure Park.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we\u2019re so far away from being able to defend that ask,\u201d councilor Dan Fallon said, noting that the town made several large investments over the past year, including the addition of new communications, housing and environmental coordinators to town staff. \u201cSo before you go looking for sales tax dollars and new revenue streams, there\u2019s a whole list of things we need to go through to defend it. Is that new labor number responsible? Are we investing our dollars adequately? \u2026 As a taxpayer, there\u2019s no way I\u2019m going to put up with that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Council member Deborah Shaner \u2014 who\u2019s set to leave office following April\u2019s election \u2014 urged her colleagues to reconsider, noting the need for additional revenue and slamming the council for what she called \u201cirresponsible\u201d spending over recent years.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t agree that we don\u2019t need to have more revenue streams,\u201d Shaner said. \u201c\u2026 I\u2019m leaving here in a couple months with fear in my heart because of how much money we\u2019re spending, and how nobody is alarmed by these expenditures and revenues starting to catch up with each other. It\u2019s too late once your revenues are underneath your expenditures.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease wake up, and pay attention to what\u2019s happening here. We\u2019re spending too much money. \u2026 I hope somebody pays attention to these numbers turning upside down before it\u2019s too late. Because I\u2019m leaving with fear, and I\u2019ve watched what I consider to be some pretty irresponsible and pretty frivolous spending.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ultimately, council members decided not to make any changes to the town\u2019s existing revenue sources, at least not until a specific use for increased funds is identified.<\/p>\n

And the council did voice a dedication to be watchful with future spending.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last eight years, we\u2019ve been very fortunate,\u201d Mayor Gary Wilkinson said. \u201cThe economy has been very good \u2026 but all these new things are plateauing. And those good times aren\u2019t going to last. I would emphasize being careful on how we spend money.\u201d<\/p>\n

via:: Summit Daily<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A view of downtown Frisco’s Main Street on Tuesday, Dec. 17.Liz Copan \/ ecopan@summitdaily.com FRISCO \u2014 Annual expenditures are growing much quicker than Frisco\u2019s revenue streams, and town officials are working to strike a balance between offering services and cutting costs.  But until council members have a specific project in mind, they\u2019ve decided not to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[99],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-804886","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-20 00:50:11","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSMT The Mountain","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=804886"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804886\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=804886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=804886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=804886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}